Talk:Cuyahoga River

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Rather than do a revert the article myself I figured I'd start a discussion about the Cuyahoga River as a boundary. While it and the Portage Path are often described as the western boundary of the US at that time, they were actually the western boundary of the area for European settlers. The portion to the west was for the Indians. It was all part of the Northwest territory that was part of the settlement with the British at the end of the Revolutionary War. --Beirne 00:07, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)

You are correct, sir. The idea that the Treaty of Greenville established the Cuyahoga has the western boundary of the United States originates from a misreading of the treaty text. The treaty states in its Article 5:

To prevent any misunderstanding about the Indian lands relinquished by the United States in the fourth article, it is now explicitly declared, that the meaning of that relinquishment is this: the Indian tribes who have a right to those lands, are quietly to enjoy them, hunting, planting, and dwelling thereon, so long as they please, without any molestation from the United States; but when those tribes, or any of them, shall be disposed to sell their lands, or any part of them, they are to be sold only to the United States; and until such sale, the United States will protect all the said Indian tribes in the quiet enjoyment of their lands against all citizens of the United States, and against all other white persons who intrude upon the same. And the said Indian tribes again acknowledge themselves to be under the protection of the said United States, and no other power whatever.

In other words, the United States did not relinquish sovereignty over the Indian lands (they couldn't, for instance, make a treaty with Great Britain for protection), but rather, created the first "insular areas" of the United States by giving local control to a non-state government, and forbidding white settlement. Kbrooks 20:23, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I expanded the environmental paragraph to reflect the impact of Combined Sewer Overflows and dams on the water quality, including a brief discussion of the mitigation efforts undertaken at the Munroe Falls and Kent Dams--and the proposal by Advanced Hydro Solutions to draw a small amount of power from a large dam.--RattBoy 01:27, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

I edited the latest changes a bit to remove some POV and correct a fact. The coal-burning plant survived into the 80's or 90's but I couldn't find the date. It definitely wasn't the 70s. In the paragraph on the Advanced Hydro's power plant I felt that a little more of their reasoning could be used to balance the paragraph. While the existing quote is good it should have a reference so we know where the quote comes from. Their point could also be added that the dam was created to generate power, which I think AHS makes but I couldn't find a source and don't want to create new info for the article.--Beirne 03:22, July 28, 2005 (UTC)

The reference for the existing quote is the Falls News and Press article[1], linked later in the text. The point, that the dam was created to generate power, is already made in the second paragraph in this section-an edit that took place on 7/21/05. RattBoy 10:16, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

I removed the "quote" this morning. The word "mitigated" was nowhere to be found in the article so it was not an actual quote. I replaced it with the points made in favor of the dam from the BJ article. --Beirne 12:11, July 28, 2005 (UTC)

There appears to be a misunderstanding here. The quote appeared in the original article which was linked. After the Falls News-Press apparently changed its URL, the link was changed, referencing an article which did not include the quote (though it did include the present-tense form, "mitigate").

In the Falls News-Press July 18 article, Paragraph 18 reads:

"(Company president David) Sinclair noted the firm will ensure the impact to the Gorge Metro Park 'is mitigated as much as possible . . . physically, environmentally [and] aesthetically.'"

Therefore the quote is real, in fact, though its source is a different article from the one currently linked. I'd recommend re-including the quote in the article.

OK, makes sense.--Beirne 13:01, July 29, 2005 (UTC)

I think we need to be careful about how we achieve balance in this article. Since the project is opposed by many groups-not just PETA and Tree Huggers For A Stagnant Economy-and apparently supported only by entities which stand to gain financially from the project, reporting in a "he-said, she-said" fashion is doing a disservice to the intrepid surfer. In particular, I'd like to balance AHP's impressive-sounding "taking 10,000 cars off the road" claim with some context. Their stat is over the 50-year lifetime of the project. Therefore, they're proposing the perpetual operation of a dam which has known, large detrimental effects on the river's ecology, justifying it by taking the equivalent of 20 cars off the road per year. That goal could clearly be achieved (and surpassed) by small conservation efforts which would have no detrimental impact on the river. I plan to do some more research before I insert text which will put their grandiose claims in perspective.--RattBoy 10:50, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

OK, see what you come up with. It might be worth it for both of us to reread the Npov article to know how to best write this. --Beirne 13:01, July 29, 2005 (UTC)

The public meeting took place yesterday, so I'm adding a link to the news story in the Akron Beacon Journal. However, I don't know how long the article will be viewable.--RattBoy 10:16, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

It may be good to do more formal references at the end of the article and reference it as a newpaper article rather than a web page. I suspect, though, that with the news changinig the reference to the article will soon be obsolete. --Beirne 12:11, July 28, 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. The lynx obtained by searching the Falls News-Press archive on the words, "Advanced Hydro" are:

Removal could be in dam's future (May 17, 04) by Phil Keren, Editor

Change proposed for Gorge Dam (July 18, 05) by Phil Keren, Editor

Metro Parks discuss future of Gorge Dam (July 25, 05) by Lauren Passell, Reporter

--RattBoy 10:50, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

I added a references section with these and the BJ article. I don't have time right now to fix the citations in line and won't be able to work on this for the next few days. --Beirne 13:01, July 29, 2005 (UTC)

I added the 7/28/05 BJ editorial to the References section. I'm not certain that an editorial really qualifies as a "Reference," however. If someone moves it or nukes it, I won't pitch a big-ol' fit.--RattBoy 23:50, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

Someday I'd like to add more info to the description of CSO's and the dissolved oxygen content in the Shipping Channel--and maybe some more positive stuff about what is, in IMHO, a troubled but lovable river that has a lot to offer. But...one thing at a time.--RattBoy 23:50, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

Shortly, I'll try to add some information on the Navigation Channel, the importance of the Cuyahoga River and the Ohio and Erie Canal as contributers to the development of an American national economy (the O&E closed the circle with regard to waterborne shipping from NYC to New Orleans, and opened up the Northwest Territories to settlement), and the increased numbers and varieties of aquatic vertebrates since the improvement of H2O quality. Avogadro94 21:23, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Someone's copying word-for-word...

Just passing through, but I noticed that a passage in this article is identical to a passage on an EPA webpage - http://www.epa.gov/glnpo/aoc/cuyahoga.html

EPA site: The Cuyahoga River is located in northeast Ohio. It begins its 100-mile journey in Geauga County, then flows south to Cuyahoga Falls where it turns sharply north until it empties into Lake Erie. The river drains 813 square miles of land in portions of six counties. Native Americans referred to the U-shaped river as the Cuyahoga or "crooked river."

Fires plagued the Cuyahoga beginning in 1936 when a spark from a blow torch ignited floating debris and oils. Fires erupted on the river several more times before June 22, 1969, when a river fire captured national attention when Time magazine described the Cuyahoga as the river that "oozes rather than flows" and in which a person "does not drown but decays." This event helped spur an avalanche of pollution control activities resulting in the Clean Water Act, Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, and the creation of the federal and state Environmental Protection Agencies.

Wikipedia: The Cuyahoga River is located in Northeast Ohio. It begins its 100 mile (160 km) journey in Geauga County, then flows south to Cuyahoga Falls where it turns sharply north and runs through Cleveland until it empties into Lake Erie. It also flows through the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, established in 2000 from the Cuyahoga National Recreation Area, which was protected in 1974. The river drains 813 square miles (2,105 km²) of land in portions of six counties. Native Americans referred to the U-shaped river as the Cuyahoga or "crooked river".

....

Fires plagued the Cuyahoga beginning in 1936 when a spark from a blow torch ignited floating debris and oils. Fires erupted on the river several more times before June 22, 1969, when a river fire captured national attention when Time magazine described the Cuyahoga as the river that "oozes rather than flows" and in which a person "does not drown but decays". This event helped spur an avalanche of pollution control activities resulting in the Clean Water Act, Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, and the creation of the federal and state Environmental Protection Agency.

Anyway, figured it couldn't hurt to bring it to someone's attention. 70.25.208.177 05:06, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Interesting. Since the Ohio EPA is a public agency, I don't think this necessarily fits the definition of "plagiarism." The EPA website isn't copyrighted, as far as I can tell. Anyone else have any legal knowledge that bears on this issue?--RattBoy 02:31, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Plagiarism and coypright violation are two completely separate issues. Plagiarism is an ethical matter of copying another's work without giving due credit. Copyright is a legal matter. It may be "legal" to copy text in the public domain (as works of U.S. government agencies are), but it is very dubious ethics to not credit the source of material used. And WP:CITE is a widely accepted guideline for articles. older≠wiser 03:15, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] No crossings?

There appear to be no bridge fans in Cleveland. Is this true? A number of rivers have these things called "bridges" and "ferrys" and even "tunnels". As a result, various Wikipedians have created "List of crossings" articles, such as List of crossings of the Columbia River, List of crossings of the Rivière des Prairies, List of crossings of the River Thames, List of crossings of the Connecticut River, and many others. I'm not in the Cleveland area, but maybe I could get y'all started on this using Yahoo maps. What say you? Let's see.... List of crossings of the Cuyahoga River - Denimadept (talk) 21:29, 28 January 2008 (UTC)